Apple Patent Application Shows How It Wants to Bend Glass

A new patent application from Apple has turned up online that shows an interesting process for making curved glass – and potentially hints at new gadgets with such screens. The process starts with a flat piece of glass like you would find on top of a smartphone or other gadget from Apple. The heated glass is then slumped over a contoured form to create a curved piece of glass.

Presumably, this type of glass bending is easier and more efficient than other methods for creating curved glass. Notably, the patent application hints that we could possibly see tablets and smartphones from Apple in the future that have curved screens. However, the contour I see in the patent application looks more like a mouse to me.

Apple is rather famous for its seamless, modern designs so I could see this easily being a way to curve glass to make the touch sensitive surface of the top of a future mouse. Of course, Apple and other manufacturers attempt to patent all sorts of ideas that never get used, so who knows if this technology will ever turn up in an actual product.